Dev Blog 144: Soon releasing Alpha 34, beginning work on Alpha 35 and the Airport CEO soundtrack now available!

Good evening all! Another Wednesday which means another dev blog, hot off the internet press just below:

:airplane: :airplane: :airplane:

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I’m not actually able to download the DLC on steam since I can’t see a download button… am I missing something?

Why are passport and immigration services going to be required for large stands? I get that many airlines use widebody aircraft on international flights that would require these services, however some widebody aircraft operate domestic routes as well (United has a fleet of 772s dedicated to domestic service). I assume it is already necessary to have a system in place that restricts route origin/destination to domestic only, so there shouldn’t be a technical restriction here.

My best guess is that you are concerned that large aircraft domestic routes won’t generate for airports in small, non-EU countries, however I feel like a warning in the R&D project would be more appropriate.

Also, on a related note, is there any chance we could get passenger/staff nationalities adjusted with this update. Currently it appears to just randomly assign any nationality to a passenger when they are created, and there is no bias based on airport location, or where the flight is headed. I feel like it is very weird to have a domestic airport in the middle of a large county, like the USA, or China, where most of the passengers are foreigners.

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Yes, given the vast ability in ACEO to place your airport anywhere in the world systems like this come with a set of challenges. Looking at the rules and regulations across the world and with EU and Schengen as just a “fun” example it quickly becomes very obvious that it’ll be very difficult and add little value to the average player to spend weeks on realistically simulating local rules across the map (and local exceptions). Large flights, in general, will most likely come from a different country, even most medium flights could do that, hence those delimitations. Adding strict requirements on the relationship between a flight’s origin and the stand it will arrive on adds a lot of complexity on an already complex process of scheduling flights both manually or automatically as a result of the contracts you accept, flights offered in that contract and is something that we’re sure that pro CEOs will have no issue of handling, but that new CEOs will struggle with even at a later stage of the game.

As we wrote, the system is still in the development stage and things might change, but we’ll at least begin in this “simple” end and make sure that works, and not bite off more than we can chew already from the start. If there’s an opening to simulate a more realistic way we will of course explore it, but this will be the base line functionality! :slight_smile:

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Great Devblog guys :smiley:

However I also agree on that large aircraft can be used on domestic routes. I also understand that you guys are trying to make a game that is enjoyable for both; professional airport-fans and normal human beings who has no idea what an “airport” is :stuck_out_tongue:

However I personally don’t want this feature to be a one-way direction with no way to turn back or change like how it was on aircraft doors.

I had this feature down below. Maybe like how realistic destinations and weather statistics are made, a small volunteer team can work on a data for international routes or information. Later on this can be chosen on settings of new game difficulty like “Use realistic international feature Y/N”. Without it game will be simple, with it game will be hardcored.

My last words; please don’t prevent large airplanes to be used on domestic routes :sob:

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I would bet that the majority of players for Airport CEO are in it for the detail and complexity, and it’s possible that they want to play it because they get to micromanage and envision their layout for an airport with precision. I think that people who play these simulator and tycoon games usually appreciate the finer details that the average person (but not the average ACEO player) might not care less about. The average person might prefer candy crush or something like that. I think that since a lot of players drawn to get this game have a specific plan for how they want their airport to run (and be as realistic as they can make it), the large planes only being international might be a bit of a minor nuisance. Although I guess it might make things a bit more confusing, I think that large planes being domestic too would be cool.

In my country, we have one hour flights between the two biggest cities flown by big planes all the time and more often than small planes

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in real life - small planes and medium and large can do domstic or outside of country

so looking forward to having A35

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Seeing small planes in international route is rarer than seeing large airplanes in international route. It is not zero but it is SOOO rare that it may not be implemented to the game at the moment.

I assume it is already necessary to have a system in place that restricts route origin/destination to domestic only, so there shouldn’t be a technical restriction here.

Every airport in the game and every city that you build your airport have country codes in game so;

if country_of_airport =/= country_of_flight_destination_airport
make_international_flight

:wink:

My best guess is that you are concerned that large aircraft domestic routes won’t generate for airports in small, non-EU countries, however I feel like a warning in the R&D project would be more appropriate.

I actually don’t understand clearly what you mean to say @Tornadic_Outlaw . This is what I understand so please correct me;

  • Let’s say player builds an airport in Kenya and let’s assume Kenya has only 1 large airport that supports large airplanes in capital city; Nairobi: Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (NBO)
  • If he uses same IATA code of Jomo Kenyatta International Airport, game won’t generate flights from actual NBO to player airport NBO.
  • If he uses different IATA code; there will be a chance of large airplane domestic flights from NBO to player airport.

Hang on a second, large stands can accept medium flights so what player will get is domestic medium flights on flight planner so he just has to enable “accept medium flights” on large stand setup menu. Make it enabled by default for large stands located on connected to boarding desks that are placed on regular secure areas :smiley:

  • EU can be an exception and a special data can be created by community.

Oh yes! My favorite long awaited update is coming! I need to get that bit of extra time :slightly_smiling_face:

Thanks for the update guys! Can’t wait to see A34 on default and have just started playing the soundtrack on spotify. I love it!

For A35 I’m still struggling with the question I brought up last DevBlog about ‘central security’ and ‘single terminal International Airports.’

Could you elaborate if it will be possible to build airports like this with the implementation of passport control?
I’ll just quote my previous post and the video about AMS airport:
Thank you for all of your hard work!

Fully agree.

Also, adding to the game the large stand that doubles into 2 medium stands would be a perfect fit for this.

Also agree with this.

I have so far spent more than 72h of January in airports and airplanes, meaning 10% of my month. This is why I play ACEO. I know what I like and what I hate about airports I spend time and I try to implement optimal solutions in-game.

The more complex and realistic the game becomes in simulating an actual airport, the better. There’s no limit for this rule, actually.

My humble opinion: forget about making the game simple. Complexity and realistic simmulation is what makes tycoon games enjoyable. For the 1% (I guess) playing this game that don’t know how an airport works in detail, there’s tons of information in Google that will help them educate themselves. But my guess is 99% of players are actual airport/aircraft nerds like me that are looking for the most detailed, complex and realistic experience.

Ps. To make my point in a different genre: Paradox does some highly complex games, that become even more so with DLCs. And nobody would doubt their success. Way to go here.

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Wouldn’t you be able to make the Schengen zone function fairly simply by labelling all countries within it as one “in-game” country? I’m not sure if there are more examples in the world but you could also make a second database where a country is grouped into their respective regions.

Similar to this, only it would refer to the “region of airport”.

I’m also confused as to why large aircraft should be limited to international flights, nor as to why small aircraft should be limited to domestic flights. Countries such as China, India, The US, Russia and Brazil are easily large enough to support domestic wide-body flights, and collectively house about 50% of the world’s population. This means that to 50% of potential Airport CEO players, the concept of domestic wide-body flights is very reasonable. (And I’m not even counting the Schengen zone here).

At the same time it seems weird that small aircraft shouldn’t be able to fly internationally. Plenty of south-eastern European countries that are packed together and could have international routes with small aircraft. Same story around Guinea and the Caribbean Sea.

If the reasoning behind making Avgas for GA and Jet A1 for Commercial was to simplify the game and make it understandable, why would you complicate the game unrealistically by limiting the geopolitical range of aircraft sizes?

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On another matter, between the boarding desk and the area of the gate there is a door that is Locked until the boarding opens. Areyou going to implement such a door that opens by staff when the boarding start?

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Wonderful!

My humble opinion: forget about making the game simple. Complexity and realistic simmulation is what makes tycoon games enjoyable. For the 1% (I guess) playing this game that don’t know how an airport works in detail, there’s tons of information in Google that will help them educate themselves. But my guess is 99% of players are actual airport/aircraft nerds like me that are looking for the most detailed, complex and realistic experience.

I disagree on that. Yes we, as the community hang out on forum, are familiar with airports and how things work. But there are other communities around the internet who can’t even talk English like us. There is a majority of players use Steam discussion topic. These people are more than 1% and they sometimes don’t know what is an “airport”.

So the best way to approach is how it is said on Dev blog as well “easy if you want, hard if you can”. Game has to be easy but players, by themselves, will be able to make it harder for themselves :wink:

I actually like this motto maybe it should be written on the logo of AirportCEO :smiley:

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Hello everyone,
Just touching on two things really quickly: Large airplanes on short (and/or domestic routes) are a thing. Anybody living in Asia can tell you. Example: Hong Kong - Xiamen (less than a 2h flight). Last time I felw with Cathay, they were using a B777 or A340.

In terms of difficulty: You guys may have the data to prove me wrong, but most people who play ACEO more than just a few hours love the detail and difficulty. At least in my mind it is a common misconception those days that you have to have to beat a game without much effort.
Beginner friendly means that you are guided, not that the game must be easy in late-game.
As someone who likes simulators in general, take DCS World. I’d argue that the majority of people plays this game, because it is such a challenge with such detail and realism, not despite of it.
Same goes for ACEO. I was thrilled by the fact that you guys went down the realism path early on to be as close to the real deal as possible - with all the challenges for players and devs.
“The other airport game” went down a more arcade way, which is fine, but also the reason why I love the concept of ACEO more.

So much for “really quickly”… :smiley:

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Can’t wait! Quick question, which update was going to have support for multiple terminals?

I think 35, so this next one

“My last words; please don’t prevent large airplanes to be used on domestic routes :sob:

I don’t understand how this could change the gaming experience in any way. Planes would still land and take off regardless of if they are international or domestic flights.
If this is only for realism reasons, I think we are missing the fact that the game is a tycoon, not a simulator.

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